The genre-bending mystery show comes to an emotionally satisfying conclusion for the two couples but leaves a few threads dangling for season 2.
The Peacock sci-fi mystery series The Resort ending explained many of its biggest questions while raising a few more. The Resort's main cast includes Cristin Milioti and William Jackson Harper as Emma and Noah, a couple celebrating their 10th wedding anniversary with a vacation at a luxury resort in the Yucatán. The show quickly makes clear that all is not well with the marriage, but the relationship is rekindled by the mystery of Sam (Skyler Gisondo) and Violet (Nina Bloomgarden), a teenage couple who went missing 15 years earlier. The Resort seamlessly blends genres, moving from murder mystery to science fiction to an Indiana Jones-style adventure in the final two installments.
What begins as a potential criminal conspiracy involving the immensely influential Frías family becomes a mind-bending temporal conundrum as the parallel stories of Violet and Sam and Emma and Noah become increasingly intertwined. In the finale of The Resort, all four characters reach the fabled Pasaje. It becomes an Eldorado for the grieving Violet in 2007 and the grieving Emma in the present day. After a treacherous journey, Emma finds Sam and Violet afloat in a pool, having not aged a single day since their disappearance. It's through this discovery that the final pieces of The Resort ending begin falling into place.
Sam & Violet Are Alive & They Transcended Time
The Resort ending explained that Sam and Violet were not murdered, which had become increasingly unlikely, especially given the lack of credible suspects. Both Baltasar (Luis Gerardo Méndez) and Alex (Ben Sinclair) are quickly discounted as potential murderers and instead become valuable resources in tracking down the missing teenagers and leading them all to Pasaje. The Resort ending briefly hints the couple may have drowned in a tragic accident during the 2007 hurricane, but it's then revealed that they've instead been in stasis for the past 15 years.
In the moments before they nearly drowned, Violet was drawn to something unseen, a vision later confirmed to be her dead mother. This is what saved her and Sam from drowning in the cave during the hurricane, but it also led to them being preserved for the past 15 years. In The Resort, Cristin Milioti's Emma is also drawn to the pool, hearing the laughter of the child she lost and never got to see. However, just as she is about to join Sam and Violet in the pool, she relents and instead revives the young couple from their stasis in The Resort ending.
Waking up in 2022, it feels as if only five minutes have passed for Sam and Violet. The responses of their respective parents are vastly different. Sam's parents hang up on him and VIolet's father Murray is speechless, visibly moved by being reunited with his missing daughter. The past 15 years have been tough on Murray (Nick Offerman), as he moved from place to place, performing shady jobs for government contractors and never putting down roots. Finally reunited with his daughter, the scarred and bedraggled Murray can once again turn into the loving family man introduced in The Resort episode 1.
What's Next For Emma And Noah?
In the previous episode, Emma and Noah's marital difficulties came to a head when she lamented how co-dependent they had become, as The Resort ending explained. Fearing they were both losing their individuality, she pointed out how, rather than reignite their spark, Emma's quest for Pasaje became another way for a concerned Noah to keep an eye on her. In an emotionally raw performance by Cristin Milioti, Emma admits to Noah, via an overheard conversation with Murray, that she wants to find Pasaje, so she can see her daughter's face, as she had refused to when she awoke to be told her daughter had died after only living for an hour.
Noah's concern for Emma, and her refusal to confront her traumatic experience, have driven a wedge between the couple. Pursuing Pasaje based on the romanticized ideal of Sam and Violet, who like Noah and Emma fell in love at Christmas, is a way for Emma to reconnect with their relationship as it was before. When she finally reaches Pasaje, however, she decides not to enter the pool, later telling Noah that she "didn't want to lose 15 years." There's a dual meaning to this statement.
On the one hand, it's an obvious reference to the time that was lost by Sam and Violet when they transcended time, as The Resort ending explained. More importantly for Emma and Noah, it also affirms that contrary to what she may have let him believe, she still wants to remain married to Noah. Her discussion with Violet about seeing her mother again confirms that Emma finally makes her peace with the death of her daughter and is ready to move on with her life. She still carries the pain of loss but no longer lets it consume her, as she tells Violet: "It's always there...but it gets better."
How Did Alex Know Everything That Was Going To Happen?
The Resort's most intriguing character is the hotel's owner, Alex (Ben Sinclair). It was revealed in episode 5 that he was the one who placed Sam and Violet's cellphones in the jungle for Emma and Noah to find 15 years later. In doing so, he triggered their whole investigation of Sam and Violet's disappearance, even though they hadn't disappeared when he planted their phones. The clues as to how Alex knew how everything would play out, despite seemingly dying years prior, are contained in the mural on the wall of his penthouse, as The Resort ending explained.
The painting depicts Sam and Violet looking out of the penthouse window and also shows Emma and Noah in the jungle. The inclusion of the meteor and dinosaurs in the mural heavily implies that Alex experienced time differently from others. The mural depicts past, present, and future existing side by side, which is how Alex surely saw time, a perspective that caused his "memory leakage."
Was It Worth Losing Time? The Resort's Real Meaning Explained
Luna best explains the show's real meaning when she observes that "They lost time [...] It's pretty on the surface, but if you squint, it's f***ed up." The Resort is a story all about the destructive pull of nostalgia. Violet is so desperate to see her mother again and relive the time in which she was alive that she abandons her father for 15 years. Sam and Violet's love story appeals to Emma because it's sort of like time travel. Through them, she can relive that time when "everything is so meaningful and the highs are, like, so f***ing high" before "the lows keep getting lower."
The Yucatán location and references to Mayan iconography throughout The Resort plays into this theme of the problems with recapturing one's youth. Spanish conquistador Ponce de León is believed to have traveled to the same region in his search for the Fountain of Youth, which was said to restore the youth of those who bathe in its waters. That's essentially what the pool at Pasaje is, because in transcending time, Sam and Violet's youth is retained, but the price is devastating their family and loved ones for 15 years. Violet observes losing time to see her mother one last time wasn't worth it, because the loss still hurts 15 years later, and always will.
Is The Resort Setting Up Season 2? Where Is Baltasar Going?
Despite wrapping up the stories of Emma and Noah and Sam and Violet, there are a few loose ends left, as The Resort ending explained, that could lead to more from the show. At the very end of The Resort, Detective Baltasar Frias hands Luna a newspaper clipping and tells her that he will see her again soon. He says he's off to "an ocean very far away" because he's found something, or rather it's found him. He walks away, showing that the back of his jacket is stitched with a representation of three friends looking out to sea.
When Luna reads the clipping, she smiles a knowing smile and leaves the poolside bar. Depending on how well the show performs on Peacock, there could be a season 2 for The Resort, focused on where Baltasar is going. Given the handful of clues, it's clear that their time-sensitive friend and employer Alex may not be dead after all and is out there somewhere in an ocean very far away.
What Resort Showrunner Andy Siara Says About The Season 1 Ending
The Resort ending explained as much as it could, but there were still a few stones left unturned. Showrunner Andy Siara had a few things to say about The Resort season 1 ending, and its sequel potential. While the story of The Resort has been completed, Siara purposefully left things open-ended in case anyone wanted to take a crack at The Resort season 2. In an interview (via Collider), Siara discussed The Resort ending, and how he keeps it just ambiguous enough to continue the story.
According to Siara, if Peacock wanted The Resort season 2, he has plenty of ideas for how the story would continue, particularly, with Luis Gerardo Mendez's Baltasar. "If Peacock wants to do another one, I know how to do that and have different paths forward and multiple seasons that might include some of the characters, might include a whole new cast and stuff." It sounds almost like The Resort would end up mirroring The White Lotus in an anthology capacity if all of the new cast stuff is to be believed. That being said, Siara purposefully ended The Resort the way he did, just in case there won't be a second installment.
